Dad, Husband, Physician, Writer - Follow me on this unpredictable writing journey. Who knows? One day I might churn out something genius...
Atlanta, GA
Joined October 2011
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History is just a long list of people confidently doing the dumbest thing possible at any given moment.
Like the time Napoleon invaded Russia in winter.
Or when Blockbuster turned down Netflix.
Or when I explained Bitcoin to my wife in 2011… and only bought one $25 bitcoin.
Learn from the past—or at least laugh at it. Follow me @JKHallATL for more
author.jkeithhall.com/
J Keith Hall retweeted
I just learned there are millions of Americans living in a place that basically requires the government to keep the “ground turned on”.
And most of the people who live there are like:
“Government is the problem.”
The history behind this is somehow even more ridiculous.
substack.com/@jkhallatl/note…
“I was just about to text you” gets less believable the longer we haven’t spoken.
After three months, you weren’t “about to.”
You briefly remembered I exist and want credit for caring.
substack.com/@jkhallatl/note…
Forgetting somebody's name is a tiny social mistake.
Pretending you remember it turns you into a CIA operative running a covert mission in the produce section.
Because instead of just saying "Remind me your name," you'll spend 20 minutes conducting an intelligence operation.
"So good seeing you again, man!"
"Man" is doing ALL the work here.
Then you start gathering intel:
"How's the family?"
Maybe their spouse walks up and says the name.
"What are you working on these days?"
Maybe their company badge is visible.
"Still living in the same place?"
Maybe they mention a street name and you can triangulate their identity through LinkedIn later.
Then somebody else walks up and you think you're SAVED:
"Oh! Have y'all met?"
Because now THEY have to introduce themselves.
This is the social equivalent of getting two witnesses to identify each other so you don't have to admit you're lost.
And here's the thing: *they already know you forgot.*
They can see you circling their name like it's a live grenade.
Now both of you are trapped in a politeness hostage situation nobody can escape.
All because humans would rather construct an elaborate intelligence-gathering operation than endure three seconds of mild embarrassment.
Just say: "Remind me your name."
It's infinitely kinder than spending 20 minutes cycling through "brother," "boss," "my guy," "champ," "chief," and eventually...
"you."
The grocery-store checkout divider might be humanity's most successful form of government.
It's six inches of plastic with no police, no laws, and no enforcement mechanism.
Yet the second you put it between your Frosted Flakes and a stranger's rotisserie chicken, everybody understands: This is my property. That is your property. Do not annex my grapes.
No one has ever crossed the divider line. No one has ever said, "Actually, those are MY Oreos." The social contract is absolute.
Nostalgia is the easiest political platform because you don’t have to explain how anything will work.
A vision for the future requires plans, numbers, tradeoffs, competence and (worst of all) follow up questions.
But “Let’s go back to the good old days”?
That’s as vague as it comes.
You don’t even have to specify WHICH days.
And the funniest part is that most of the people being promised a return to some glorious era couldn’t actually return to it.
Their job didn’t exist.
Their neighborhood didn’t exist.
Their interracial marriage might’ve been illegal.
Their daughter couldn’t get a credit card.
Their gay cousin was pretending to be “really into theater.”
Half their medicine hadn’t been invented yet.
The easiest political promise to sell is “We’ll make things like they used to be.”
Of course we will.
The past has the greatest PR team in human history: your memory.
Psychologists call it “rosy retrospection”, our tendency to remember yesterday more fondly than we actually experienced it. Apparently the brain has an editor who deletes the racism, recessions, bad knees and lead paint, then adds a Motown soundtrack.
That’s why a politician promising to “take us back” has an advantage. They don’t have to prove the good old days were actually good.
They just have to beat the version of history you made up in your head.
A promise about the future is harder. The future requires imagination, uncertainty and change.
Nostalgia only requires amnesia.
In 1847, a doctor named Ignaz Semmelweis figured out that washing your hands before delivering babies would stop women from dying.
The mortality rate dropped from 18% to 2% immediately.
His colleagues' response: "How dare you suggest our gentleman hands are dirty."
They rejected his findings, called him crazy, and kept operating with hands covered in autopsy residue and God knows what else.
Semmelweis got so frustrated calling them murderers (which, fair) that he lost his job, had a breakdown, and died in an asylum at 47.
Cause of death? An infection.
The man who discovered how to prevent infection died of an infection because doctors refused to wash their hands.
Twenty years later, germ theory was proven and everyone said, "Oh wow, Semmelweis was right."
I once waited 45 minutes for a croissant in New York City.
By minute 10, I could’ve left.
By minute 20, I had enemies.
By minute 30, I had a community.
By minute 45, I was ordering pastries like the governor had declared a state of emergency.
This story is not really about a croissant.
substack.com/@jkhallatl/note…
Old New York has one historical mystery nobody explains:
How did families living 10 people deep in tiny tenement apartments keep having MORE CHILDREN?
No privacy.
No farm.
No birth control aisle at CVS.
Yet somehow: baby No. 8.
I went looking for the answer.
substack.com/@jkhallatl/note…
In 1909, one New York man had a very small problem that somehow escalated into a public dignity emergency.
It involved clothing, theft, the police, and a decision that absolutely made sense at the time.
substack.com/@jkhallatl/note…
The World Cup had the internet asking a very reasonable question:
“Wait… where are Argentina’s Black people?”
Argentina: “What Black people?”
History: “Oh, I have RECEIPTS.”
Because long before this summer’s racist fan incidents reignited a global debate about Argentina and race, former president Carlos Menem reportedly offered:
“Black don’t exist in Argentina. Brazil has that problem.”
substack.com/@jkhallatl/note…
I just learned there are millions of Americans living in a place that basically requires the government to keep the “ground turned on”.
And most of the people who live there are like:
“Government is the problem.”
The history behind this is somehow even more ridiculous.
substack.com/@jkhallatl/note…